


All The Way

by astolat



Series: Captain America works [7]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Consent Issues, First Time, M/M, Road Trip of Justice, Sex Pollen, Virginity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-27
Updated: 2014-05-27
Packaged: 2018-01-26 18:36:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1698491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/astolat/pseuds/astolat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I didn't even know I <em>liked</em> cake," Steve said.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All The Way

**Author's Note:**

> With many thanks to Cesperanza for beta! <3

When cornered, Hydra operatives almost all reacted one of two ways: either they grabbed guns and blazed away, or they surrendered as fast as possible, often while still in hiding under tables or from inside closets. Steve was ready for either one, but this time when he pushed open the door into the lab, the lone scientist behind the table full of flasks and bottles was a woman who first seemed paralyzed with fright. She was clutching one of the flasks, but she didn’t do anything with it; she just stared at him from behind enormous glasses, her eyes wide. He was about to tell her to lie down on the floor, and then she squeaked out, “It’s not just you, is it?”

“Put that—what?” Steve said, pausing, confused. Not that he really cared what Hydra personnel thought, but he was usually more than enough, as far as they were concerned.

“Rest of the floor’s clear,” Sam said, swinging in through the door behind him. He looked at the woman.

“Oh good,” she said, sounding relieved, and then she lobbed the flask at them.

Steve jerked the shield up, moving to cover Sam and back him out of the room, but even as he made the automatic move he realized it was the wrong one. She hadn’t thrown it _at_ them, she’d thrown it at the floor. He tried to correct and catch it instead, but he missed; the glass smashed. The woman dived through a back door, hitting a button as she went; both the doors slammed shut, and the liquid was boiling away into the air, vanishing. 

Sam was shoving something at his face, a thin piece of dark cloth; Steve draped it over his head, held his breath, and ran for the button the woman had pushed. Sam was trying to get the door behind them open again. He’d tied another rag over his own head. Neither of them said a word, conserving breath. 

Through a porthole in the back door, Steve could see the scientist on the other side, backed up against the wall of a small chamber, staring back at him nervously. He looked at the switch, but it had a biometric lock. The door was thick steel, and the window was triple-layered plate glass of some kind. He slammed the shield against it: no luck. The metal around the hinges gave when he hit it, but that was still going to be twenty minutes getting through there, not twenty seconds. He turned back around: Sam was backing away from the other door, firing shots systematically at the edge near knob-height, trying to bust the locking mechanism. When he’d emptied his clip, he stood clear; Steve charged across the room and slammed into it, shield first, full strength. 

The door surface dented in, partly. Steve backed up for another run. He was mentally cataloguing himself, checking for symptoms: burning eyes, runny nose—nothing yet. He’d had to breathe twice so far, just short sniffs through the nose. He took another run, slammed into the door again. He was feeling hot, painfully hot. He gasped once, unable to help it, and staggered away from the door for a third try. Sam was bent over, gripping the edge of a lab table and one hand braced on his knee, chest heaving. 

Steve clenched his breath in, lungs bursting. He’d brought Sam here, he’d gotten Sam into this. He threw himself at the door again. It didn’t give. 

Then he was sliding down the door, shivering and hot at the same time. He couldn’t stop panting, his lungs trying to make up for lost oxygen. Sam was on the floor, on his back, hands pressed over his face. Steve crawled over to him. He grabbed Sam’s arm. 

Time started to go in fits and starts. They were on the floor near the door, then they were across the room at the sink, drinking huge gulps directly from the faucet. They were both naked, standing in puddles of water, scrubbing down their skin with their t-shirts. They were up against the wall, kissing, desperate, and Sam’s hands on his skin were the only place he wasn’t burning hot; Sam’s mouth on his cool and sweet and too good to let go. 

It kept going. They were all over each other, touching, licking—Steve had one bright crisp moment of clarity and relief, coming, Sam’s mouth on his nipple and his hips shoved up hard against Sam’s thigh; a burst of intense gratitude followed by the sudden thought, _wait did we just—?_ and then time lurched ahead: he came clear again on top of Sam, in his arms, grinding down against him, slick between their bodies and Sam staring up at him saying confused, “Steve, what the fuck are we,” and Steve cracked up helplessly. 

“Jesus,” Sam said, and he was laughing, too, and then he was rolling them over. 

Steve didn’t remember much of anything for a while after that, nothing but pure uncomplicated pleasure, heat washing over his skin in bursts, the feel of Sam’s heartbeat against his own chest, the luxury of being _held_ , wrapped up completely in Sam’s arms. He had one brief flash of someone in a gas mask standing over them—the scientist, holding up a phone like she was going to take a picture, but in another flash she was gone; the phone was in smashed pieces on the floor, and Steve was gasping, coming again, on nothing but Sam’s tongue sliding over the crease of his elbow and a hand cupped between his legs, easy and intimate. 

It got better, or worse. The clear stretches started to last a little longer, but in between they were apparently thinking things through a little more. Steve came sobbing out loud against Sam’s neck, one hand curled tight around him, holding on: they’d slotted themselves together, cocks sliding wetly against each other, and they’d gotten something, vaseline maybe; a first aid kit was lying scattered across the floor, and Sam’s fingers were shoved deep into him, and his own fingers were greased and sliding deep, too. 

“Come on, come _on_ ,” Steve said, too far gone to care, he didn’t care, he wanted, _wanted_ , and the next time he surfaced Sam was _in_ him, panting and working on him, each thrust so good that Steve stayed in the moment for a long time because he just kept coming, the first real stretch of relief, and then Sam came too and groaned, and his head fell forward against Steve’s shoulder. 

“Steve, fuck,” he said, voice pained, tight with apology. 

“Forget it,” Steve said. He felt so high, like being on that right side of sloppy-drunk where nothing hurt and nothing mattered, not even breathing; only this was better than Steve remembered that ever being. He was kissing Sam again. “How long has it been?” he mumbled around kisses. 

Sam managed to get a look in at his watch. “Forty minutes,” which was impossible; it had been hours. It had been forever. Time was starting to run in a straight line again; Steve was starting to be able to think about what he was doing, but only the same way he could watch himself saying something stupid even while his head went _Steve, you should probably shut up now_ and he kept on babbling. Sam was jerking him hard again, steady strokes of his big warm hand. It felt so good. 

“Did she get out?” Sam said. The dented door was standing open; there was no sign of the scientist anymore. Steve groaned. Then Sam nuzzled into his neck, warm scrape of his beard against the underside of Steve’s chin, and he didn’t care. 

Except if she’d gotten in touch with any other Hydra operatives—“We have to get out of here,” Steve said.

“Yeah,” Sam said. They were jerking off together, hands tangled around their dicks, and after they came that time, they managed to get themselves together. They pulled on their pants, Steve got his shield. They staggered up and fell against the wall right near the door and rubbed off a couple more, pants open, full-body making out, wrapped around each other and kissing hungrily; after that they went out into the hall, moving as fast as they could.

They got outside: the whole base was tucked under a small half-rotting shack in a field that had been going to seed for at least twenty years, another piece of evidence to show how deep Hydra’s roots had grown. Then another time-lurch hit: Steve was in Sam’s arms again, rolling in the sun-warmed tall grass, stalks bending and cracking underneath them, sweet damp smell of broken leaves and dirt beneath them; and then he was fucking Sam in the back seat of the car, doors wide open and the seats still hot enough to almost burn skin, sticking to their bodies until they sweated them slick.

Afterwards he left Sam collapsed on the back seat, arm thrown over his face, and managed to drag himself into the driver’s seat. The motel was only fifteen minutes away. Halfway there, Sam said in a strangled voice, “Fuck it, get back here,” and Steve pulled over onto the shoulder in a smear of dust and pebbles and crawled into the back seat.

They finally made it back to the room, half-naked, wrecked. The beds hadn’t been made yet from last night. Steve felt like there was something he was forgetting about that, and then it didn’t matter; they were falling on the nearest bed, kicking away the pushed-back covers, bed squeaking loudly underneath them in protest. He only remembered too late they hadn’t bolted the door when housekeeping rattled the knob. “Oh, jeez,” Steve said, strangled, but he was riding Sam, across his hips, and he couldn’t stop—he couldn’t bear to stop. He just squeezed his eyes shut and heard Sam shout, “No, thanks!” and the door shut very fast, and he was red and hot and Christ, mortified, but he still didn’t want to stop. 

Sometime after dark, Sam finally just gave out: head fallen back against the pillows and eyes shut, less asleep than unconscious. Steve wistfully tried to rouse him for a while, nosing at him, touching, but the fever had broken, and he was starting to feel sluggish too. Finally he spread himself over Sam’s body, as much skin touching as he could manage, and slept.

#

Morning was a brutal hangover, mouth gummy and eyes painfully dry. They were both shaky and sore; Sam could barely walk. Steve didn’t feel a whole lot better, serum notwithstanding. They got to the bathroom together and Sam limpingly got himself into the too-shallow tub, one leg craned slowly over at a time, lowering himself carefully, and ran the water in on top of himself. “Oh, thank God,” he said, head tipping back against the rim and eyes closing as the hot water climbed over him.

Steve sat down on the lid of the toilet. “Are you okay?” he asked.

“Ask me again after I’ve been in here for a couple of days,” Sam said. He sighed out, long and deep. “Man, I don’t know. I feel pretty much like—if I busted my ass and kept a strict diet all my life, and somebody just force-fed me a giant slab of cake. I’m pissed off as hell, but damn if that cake didn’t taste good.”

Steve said, “You haven’t—” and stopped, embarrassed; he didn’t have a right to ask Sam that question. But he’d been an oddball for not making it with anyone back in 1943, and it seemed pretty clear from the stuff he’d caught up with that he was even more of one now. It hadn’t been a conscious choice, exactly. He’d thought it would be nice to wait for the _right_ girl; but to be fair, he hadn’t been sure any girl would say yes, and then afterwards he hadn’t been sure any girl would say no, which was bad in a whole different way; and anyway then there was _asking_ — But somehow it hadn’t occurred to him Sam might have been in the same boat; he couldn’t really imagine Sam having trouble talking to girls, or guys; or to anyone about anything. 

But Sam didn’t seem to mind the question. He huffed a laugh. “Long story. First girlfriend, first time out, and she missed her period right after. We freaked out, our families found out—false alarm, but after that, my mom got me to swear on my dad’s Bible I’d wait until I got married. Since then—” He drew a line in the air with his hand, then sighed. “Hell of a way to break a streak.”

“I’m sorry,” Steve said quietly.

Sam waved a hand. “I’m not beating myself up for this one, man. That’s not a promise you can keep for anyone but yourself, anyway; I stuck to it because it worked for me. Kept my eye on the prize, you know? Besides, I wouldn’t blame myself for what some crazy-ass Hydra scientist mixed up.” He levered himself up out of the tub for a moment to look over at Steve. “Speaking of which, what the _hell_. Who even comes up with something like this?”

“Well, it did _work_ ,” Steve said, wryly.

“Don’t get me wrong, Rogers,” Sam said, “but if somebody had busted in on us with a _gun_ , I’m pretty sure I would’ve found that more compelling than even your extremely hot ass.”

Steve laughed, a little. Then he dropped his eyes, and Sam said gently, “How about you? How are you doing?” 

“I’m fine,” Steve said, automatic; and then he shook himself out of it. It was hard to remember sometimes that Sam didn’t _need_ him to be fine. “I’m—not sure.”

“The guy thing throw you for a loop?” Sam said. 

“Not really,” Steve said. “I mean, not more than—you know, thinking hey, I didn’t even know I _liked_ cake. And now hell, I’d eat cake any day of the—” 

He stopped, hearing himself, but Sam was already stretching his arms luxuriously out along the sides of the tub, sprawling back on display, grinning widely at him. “Cake’s pretty good, man,” he said, sly. 

Steve felt his face going red. Sam laughed and beckoned. “Come here,” he said. Steve went over, knelt down next to the tub, still blushing; Sam leaned over and curled a hand around the back of his neck and shook him gently. “I love you, you know that? If I was going to get drugged into eight hours of crazy wild sex with anybody, I’m glad it was you, man.” 

Steve almost felt his eyes stinging with relief. A tightness around his chest had popped open, the worry he hadn’t been able to look at head on: it was going to be okay. They were okay. “Likewise,” he said, softly. He shifted without thinking and caught himself: he’d been about to kiss Sam again. 

The red rushed right back into his face, but Sam stroked his neck and pulled him in, and they did kiss one last time: easy and deep and sweet. Then Sam pushed him back and waved him at the door. “Now get out of here and let me sit and moan in peace.” 

Steve got up, grinning; he was already feeling better. “Sorry I wasn’t easier on you,” he said, sincerely, and ducked out fast; the sopping washcloth Sam had thrown at him smacked against the door behind him. 

“If I come out there and you’re doing pushups on one hand or something, I swear I will not be responsible for my actions!” Sam shouted through the door. Steve laughed, and went to go get them some breakfast: he was starving. 

# 

They stayed inside the rest of the day eating and dozing, with the bolt thrown and the _Do Not Disturb_ on the door this time, and slept themselves out. The next morning, Sam groaned while he stretched, but they went out to Denny’s for breakfast, and afterwards they hit the road. They did rock-paper-scissors for who had to go into the office and pay the bill. Steve cheated from pure cowardice and used his edge in reflexes to wait to throw his scissors until he’d glimpsed Sam’s hand moving, going flat. Sam glared at him. Steve blinked back innocently, and then he spotted the housekeeping cart coming around the corner and dived for the car to hide. 

Sam was shaking his head as he climbed in, tossing Steve a can of Coke and sticking the receipt into the glove compartment. “I’m only letting you off the hook because it can’t be healthy for that much blood to go to a man’s head,” he said. 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Steve said firmly, and floored the gas. 

The Hydra base was still abandoned. It didn’t look like anyone had come back, and there wasn’t a lot to find. Steve hadn’t expected much in the first place: this had only been a small research station. He and Sam had just been the ones closest by when Hill had turned up intel on it, and it had been worth taking it out. Hydra was scrambling to reorganize, consolidating assets; hitting them now was the best way to keep them down, maybe ensure that they broke apart for good. 

Of course, what _was_ left was in the chem lab. There were another five vacuum-sealed vials of the stuff. Steve and Sam stared down at it from behind their gas masks. “I guess we’d better call it in,” Steve said, unenthusiastically. 

“ _You’re_ telling them what it does,” Sam said. “I’m not playing any more rock-paper-scissors with your cheating ass.” 

Steve groaned. Back outside he called Hill and told here where to send the cleanup crew, what they’d found, and then did his best to dance around exactly what the drug was and how he knew what it did. It went great. 

Hill said, “Is it capable of overriding sexual orientation?” 

“Uh,” Steve said, trying to decide: what if they just hadn’t known? “Yes?” 

“Okay,” Hill said. It sounded like she was making notes. “And it affected you despite your accelerated metabolism? That’s interesting. When was the date of your last previous sexual encounter?” 

“Uh,” Steve said. 

“In which you achieved orgasm,” Hill clarified, because the conversation hadn’t been appalling enough before. 

“I’m not really comfortable with this,” Steve said desperately, which got him a long, meaningful pause. 

“We can of course arrange for volunteers to undergo exposure to the drug for testing if that’s necessary, Captain Rogers,” Hill said, pointedly. 

Steve shut his eyes and said, “Does it count if—I was alone?” 

“Tell me both dates,” she said. 

Sam was leaning back against the car reading email on his phone the whole time, smiling beatifically as he listened in on Steve’s half of the conversation. “Let that be a lesson to you,” he said, after Steve finally escaped. 

“She’s going to put it in a _report_ ,” Steve said. “That other people are going to _read_.” 

Sam shrugged, sliding his phone away. “It’s okay, man, you can brag about landing me, I don’t mind,” he said cheerfully, and climbed back into the car. 

# 

Because apparently she hadn’t tortured Steve enough yet, Hill had arranged for a Stark Industries medical research team to meet them at a lab facility six hours away. Steve drove while Sam dozed in the passenger seat. Just another day on what Sam called their road trip of justice. It was going to be that easy, that simple. It _was_ . 

He’d always been aware of Sam, his solid presence, the promise of strength; that hadn’t changed any. It was just the details catching him suddenly: the faint sheen of sweat over his bare arms, the sweep of his closed lashes, the warm drowsy curve of his mouth. Memories kept surfacing out of the blank gaps in time, distracting. Sam’s hands gripping hard on his hips, Sam’s whole body moving against him, that steady rhythm. 

Steve groped for the already-warm Coke and drank it off, fuzzy and sour and too-sweet on his tongue, and tried to keep his eyes fixed on the road, no more side glances. It was going to be okay. The drug was just working its way through his system, that was all. He’d get it together soon. 

He needed it to be okay. It had been so— _fucking_ hard to be alone. He tried not to let on to Sam, because it wasn’t fair; he already felt more guilty than he liked about what he’d done to Sam’s life. Yeah, Sam was a grown man making his own choices, but Steve was the one who’d stuck those choices in front of him, and the kind of guy Sam was, that was as good as making the choice for him. He was a hero. Steve’s idea of one, anyway: not the bullshit of shiny costumes or superpowers, just a guy who was bedrock solid all the way through. When you showed up on that kind of guy’s doorstep with a battle at your back, you knew what he’d do: he’d put on his gear, and go to war and to hell beside you. 

Steve didn’t know how to live without people like that in his life. Peggy, Bucky, the Commandos—God, he _missed_ them. He missed being shoulder to shoulder, back to back, with people he knew all the way through. And Sam—Sam had been a friend three minutes after they’d met, a good friend one day later; two days after that, Steve had put his life into Sam’s hands, and he hadn’t taken it out since. There wasn’t a word for what that meant to him, having somebody like that. _Friend_ didn’t cut it. Brother in arms, maybe. 

But they’d won the big fight. Steve didn’t have a great case for why he still needed Sam along for taking out minor Hydra outposts and failing to find Bucky. Sam had given up his job, shut up his house, said goodbyes to his friends—and Steve wasn’t sure this mission was worthy of that. He wanted it to be, but—it was one thing to ask a guy to lay down his life to break Hydra’s back, stop them killing millions of people. It was another to ask a guy to give up everything with no real objective, no end date in sight, no furloughs—at this point, Sam was sticking with him because—well, Steve wasn’t really sure, but he had the bad feeling it was because Sam wasn’t going to let him do this alone. 

But every time he opened his mouth to say, _listen, buddy, you should go back to your life_ , the words stuck in his throat. He didn’t need Sam, maybe, but he _wanted_ him. 

Sam made a low humming sound in the seat next to him, shifting position without waking up. It was the same sound he’d made against Steve’s throat when Steve had been stroking his dick. His head was tipped back, the line of his neck stretched long, and in the sunlight there were still a few lingering dark bruises where— 

Steve jerked his eyes back to the road and sighed. Yeah. He _wanted_ Sam all right. Goddamn Hydra anyway. He looked down at the odometer: another 312 miles to go. It was going to be a long day. 

# 

The doctors and scientists poked and prodded, took vials and vials of blood, found elevated levels of this and that, nothing they were too worried about. “It’s a very interesting drug design: from what we’re seeing in the rats, it wasn’t neutralized by your metabolism because it has an extremely short half-life,” one of the scientists said absently, looking at her ipad. “In fact, it might have been designed specifically for use against you.” 

“What?” Steve said. “But why would—I mean what—but— ” He stared at the top of her head, helplessly. She was about fifty, hair pulled neatly back. It was like having to talk to his _mom_ about it.

“What he means is, why would Hydra want to have Captain America make time like a bunny,” Sam said dryly. Steve wondered if there was some way maybe he could just sneak away or hide under the table without anyone noticing.

“Well, it’s clearly a work in progress—I’m sure they would rather have killed you,” she said. “But it’s clear that their prerequisite was having it take effect quickly. Possibly it was meant as a distraction? Or for that matter, they might not have known what reaction they were going to get. The two rats we exposed just began fighting with one another. I imagine that the intense sexual response requires triggering by the presence of a potential sexual partner who is also under the influence, possibly signaled through pheromones—”

“Yes, okay,” Steve said desperately. “So how long until it’s out of our system?”

“The drug itself cleared about two hours after you inhaled it,” she said. “But it acts by drastically overstimulating hormone production. You might continue to feel various side effects from that for a couple of weeks. It shouldn’t rise to the level of interfering with your daily life.”

#

Yeah, well, maybe it shouldn’t have, but it damn well _did_. How was it not supposed to interfere with his daily life when his daily life was, wake up in the morning with Sam, work out with Sam, eat with Sam, drive somewhere with Sam, talk to Sam, go to sleep three feet away from Sam, and more to the point _not have sex_ with Sam.

Steve tried upping his workouts, but it didn’t really work. He couldn’t be completely wiped out when any time of the day they might get another call. Then after about a week he gave up and tried anyway: he threw on a forty-pound pack of gear out of the trunk and ran thirty-five miles right before bed, and as he was drifting off to exhausted sleep the thought popped into his head that he was so spent Sam could’ve held him down for it, put a firm gentle hand on the back of his neck, said, “Okay, Rogers, just lie there,” and really _given_ it to him— 

Yeah. So much for sleeping. And he was even too tired to get up and take a cold shower. Steve covered his face with a pillow and groaned into it silently. 

He’d gone his entire life without, and it had never driven him crazy before. Sure, he’d thought about it, he’d jerked off now and then. It wasn’t like he’d ever been chasing girls through the streets. Okay, he wasn’t chasing Sam through the streets either, but it was starting to feel like a close-run thing. 

Hill called the next morning. “You’ve got something for us?” Steve said urgently. He wasn’t too big to admit he really felt like punching some Hydra thugs right about now. 

“We think so,” she said. “We’ve been tracking three separate Hydra agents and they all briefly visited this same location at different times. Are you up for taking a look at it?” 

“Yes,” Steve said, gratefully. 

The location turned out to be, bizarrely, a store. A ludicrously large one. “We’re in the middle of nowhere,” Steve said, staring. People were going in and out with huge shopping carts. “What do they even sell in there, construction equipment? Hydra could have a thousand-man garrison inside this thing.” 

“How long have you been defrosted, you’ve never experienced the joys of Wal-Mart?” Sam said. 

He and Sam spent most of the day reconnoitering around the back. Lying under a bush pressed all along Sam’s side for hours did absolutely nothing to reduce Steve’s intense desire to beat the crap out of any and all Hydra operatives in range. 

By the time the store closed, Sam had spotted that one of the loading docks wasn’t in use all day; just as the parking lot finally started to clear out, one big tractor-trailer pulled in and backed into the spot. After dark they went in: they made it through the perimeter without setting off any visible alarms, and Steve got to take some frustration out on the dozen guards. Sam climbed up into the overhead grid of rafters and covered him from above as they went through the silent aisles and towards the dock. The truck was still there, container open, and a crew of four people were unloading boxes with bright glossy pictures of a truly hideous ceramic table lamp that Steve guessed was meant to look sort of like an octopus, with a sticker price of $315. 

“Inflation hasn’t been _that_ bad, has it?” Steve murmured into the comlink. 

“Dude, I don’t care about inflation: not if the thing was priced at five cents,” Sam said. “Hang on; there’s one of them on a shelf way up here in the corner.” 

Steve stayed crouched and watching, listening to Sam poke into it. “Oh, hello,” Sam murmured. “Aren’t you pretty.” 

“What is it?”

“Tac shotgun, some kind of laser targeting system, and ten packs of very strange-looking shells,” Sam said. “You’ve got to admire the chutzpah of the thing, you know? Just stop by your local Wal-Mart for all your terrorist needs.”

“Great,” Steve muttered. “They could be doing this all across the country. All right. We need to find out how far this operation goes.” 

Sam took out one of the unloaders with a single shot, and while the other three all whirled to aim up at him, Steve charged out and flattened the rest. He bent down and grabbed the one groaning the least. “Where’s your control center?” 

“Oh, Jesus, don’t kill me, I’ve got three kids,” the guy said. 

“Yeah?” Steve said grimly. “You think Hydra wasn’t going to kill parents with those guns?” He gave the guy a hard shake. “ _Where?_ ” 

The guy pointed a shaking finger down the hall. “Door labeled Senior Asset Protection Manager,” he choked out. Steve threw him back down, still angry. He smashed through the door, Sam dropping down to cover his back, and stopped short just inside the threshold. The room was bare and completely empty, except for a nozzle pumping out a faint violet gas into the air. 

“Shit, it’s a setup,” Sam said.

Steve was already turning, but even as he did, sections of the floor to either side of the door were swinging up to pen them in, a panel lowering from the ceiling. “What the hell,” Steve said, pushing Sam back up against a wall, covering him, looking for guns—this was the point where the shooting usually started, except the big things swiveling down from the ceiling weren’t firing anything. He was sweating under the lights, weirdly hot— 

“Those are _cameras_ ,” Sam said, throwing something at him. “They want video.” 

“Video of what?” Steve said, catching it—it was a gas mask, Sam had added them to their kits—and then he stared at Sam appalled. 

“Yeah,” Sam said dryly. “ _That_.” 

Steve tried to pull it on—but it was already too late. The gas was purple this time, they’d changed it, but it felt the same; he wasn’t dying, he was just desperate, burning up. But the base wasn’t clear, if they, if he and Sam started—Hydra would just shoot them, shoot _Sam_ — 

Time lurched forward: Steve came back to himself still feeling the horror; but he was still dressed, though his clothes were soaked through with sweat, and the side wall had been demolished: looked like one of the micro-grenades Sam carried. The scientist from the last base was on the other side with a crew of Hydra operatives, all of them divided between the usual two options: shooting or trying to run away. Sam was at his back, shooting at the operatives over his shoulder; they were both crouched down behind the shield. 

Steve blacked out again; the next thing he knew was cool night air on his face, and fourteen Hydra operatives in various states of unconsciousness in a heap in the loading dock. Sam was sitting on the other side with his legs dangling over the edge, shuddering, his head in his hands, his shirt off and his skin shining with sweat. 

Steve shut his eyes. If he went over and touched Sam, it would feel better; it would feel amazing. They’d make love again and again, he’d get to hold Sam in his arms, he’d get to—kiss him, to—they’d go back to the car, they’d go back to the motel, they’d— 

He made himself get out his phone. He dialed, but he couldn’t understand what Hill was saying. “We’ve been exposed again,” he repeated. Then he dropped it and sat down on the ground, head pressed against his knees, to wait. 

# 

The doctors gave them another workup, decided they were fine, but probably should avoid getting dosed again for a while. “I don’t think it’s going to be a problem,” Steve said tiredly. They’d brought the scientist in, and anyway Hydra probably wasn’t going to keep trying the same thing when they’d struck out swinging the second time around. 

“Take a couple of weeks off anyway,” Hill said. “Maybe even stay in a hotel that costs more than $75 a night. Stark’s good for it, Rogers.” 

Steve got her point, but the last thing he felt like was some time off, in a nice place, with nothing to do but lie around and think about things and try not to let on to Sam what exactly he was thinking _about_ . He needed to sweat the drugs out of his system and get over this, not take time to dwell on it. But he looked over at the other exam table: Sam wasn’t arguing or making a joke; he was just silently buttoning his shirt, his head bent down. 

“Yeah, okay,” Steve said, and looked away. 

When they got sprung, Sam took the wheel. Steve tried to get some sleep, but it wasn’t working. Whatever the doctors said about _half-life_ and _clearance_ didn’t matter worth squat. Steve couldn’t stop glancing over at Sam’s hands on the wheel, the line his beard drew around his mouth, like a frame inviting him to stare. Sam sang along softly with the radio sometimes, low honey of his voice shivering down Steve’s spine. Steve squeezed his eyes shut tight and pretended to be asleep until he finally managed to drop off. 

Steve stirred and woke up when the car slowed: it was after dark. He sat up. Sam was pulling into the lot of a huge fancy hotel, a long walkway lined with columns going to the lobby, little twinkling lights wrapped around them like Christmas in July; down the other end there was a neon blue glow of a lit-up pool. Sam put the car in park and sat back. In the silence, Steve could faintly hear laughter and music drifting on the air. 

“So,” Sam said, “we need to talk about this.” 

Steve swallowed and looked down at his hands. “I’m sorry. I guess—it’s taking a while to get out of my system—” 

“Steve, dude,” Sam said, cutting him off. “Not everything can be blamed on international terrorists, you know? This isn’t on the drug anymore, if it ever really was. It’s on us.”

Steve stopped and swallowed hard. “Oh,” he said. Tried to say; the words didn’t actually come out. Sam was right and Steve knew it, he just hadn’t wanted to face it. 

Sam waited for him to catch up, then he went on, more gently. “I get wanting to put this whole thing back on the shelf and go back to where we were. Where we were, that was good, we were good. That was easy. I thought maybe I could do that too. But I’m sorry, man. I can’t. This whole week, even just—hearing you breathe at night, driving with you next to me—” He shook his head. “Getting hit that second time, part of me was thinking— _I could have him again_ . And fucked up as it is, I almost wanted the excuse.” 

Steve stared out the window at the lights, twinkling on and off in their patterns. He loved Sam’s honesty, the way he had the courage to turn it even on himself. But it had never hurt like this before. “I’m sorry,” he said low. 

“Not anybody’s fault, man,” Sam said. “But I can’t do this thing where we’re lying to our own faces, pretending we don’t want it until we end up in bed again.”

Steve swallowed. “What do you want to do?” 

Sam didn’t answer right away. Then he sighed and jerked his chin at the hotel outside. “This is a big place. Lots of people to hang out with. We get separate rooms, give ourselves a couple weeks off from each other. See if that does it. If it doesn’t—we call it quits for a while.” 

Steve couldn’t help flinching. He didn’t say anything; he couldn’t, he didn’t have a right, but Sam had spotted it anyway. “Yeah, I don’t like it either, not least of all because I know your dumb ass is going to keep doing dumb ass things all on your own, and more of them if you don’t have anyone else to think twice about. But I’m sorry, Steve. I’m a big boy; I can get over you, but not while you’re in the next bed over, wanting me. That’s more than I can handle.” 

“No, I, I get it,” Steve said, his throat tight. 

Sam didn’t say anything else. His face was drawn and unhappy. After a moment, he nodded a little, like Steve had answered a question he hadn’t asked. He reached for the handle on the door, and Steve had the feeling, sudden and cold, that it was already over. If Sam got out of the car— 

He reached out and grabbed Sam’s wrist in desperation. Sam stopped and looked back at him. “What if—I don’t want you to get over me,” Steve blurted. 

Sam didn’t say anything; he was looking down at Steve’s hand on his arm. But he didn’t pull away. “Are you sure you want to ask me that?” he said finally. “You know I’m not an in-between kind of guy.” 

“I’m not either,” Steve said, trying not to make it sound too much like a plea. If Sam didn’t want to—

“That’s what makes it complicated,” Sam said. He was silent for a moment, then he said, “The thing is, Steve, I have to watch out for myself some, with you. In case you hadn’t noticed, you’re kind of a big deal to me already.”

Steve swallowed hard. He was pretty sure it was selfish, how good it felt hearing Sam say that; he couldn’t make himself care. 

“We didn’t make a choice about getting into this,” Sam finished softly. 

“Then let’s choose now,” Steve said, his heart pounding. He slid his hand down to grip Sam’s, lacing their fingers together. 

Sam looked down at their hands, half-smiling and shaking his head a little, but when he looked back up, his eyes were warm. “You want it that bad, huh?” 

“Oh, _I_ want it?” Steve said. He suddenly couldn’t stop smiling. He scooted closer, sliding an arm around the back of Sam’s seat. “I thought I was a big deal?” 

“Man, I should’ve known that was going to come back and bite me,” Sam said, trying to give him a glare, but he was smiling, too, like he couldn’t help it. His hand raised and settled on Steve’s cheek, thumb brushing against the corner of his mouth. 

Steve leaned into his touch, shamelessly desperate, and he couldn’t joke about it anymore. “I do want it,” he said. “Sam, I do. I want—everything.”

Then Sam was kissing him, sweet and hot and really his, this time. “Everything, huh? You got it,” Sam was murmuring into his mouth. “All the way.” 

# End 

 

**Author's Note:**

> All feedback loved, here or on [tumblr](http://astolat.tumblr.com) or [DW](http://astolat.dreamwidth.org)!


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